Look For … The Union Label….
16th January 2015
Last summer, the American Federation of Musicians hit videogame composer Austin Wintory (Monaco, Journey) with a $50,000 fine for working on The Banner Saga in violation of its (nonexistent) game music contract. Thanks to the union’s own stubbornness and greed, none of its members were allowed to compose music for videogames. A contract put together in 2012 without the input of AFM’s members was so skewed towards the union that no videogame producers were willing to agree to it. (It wasn’t until 2014 that Microsoft agreed to the terms of AFM’s revamped contract. It remains the sole company to do so.)
When Wintry worked on the game without its permission, AFM got angry and threw its toys out of the crib. Its own Local 47 (Los Angeles) took issue with the union’s BS and issued a resolution supporting Wintory in October. Perhaps due to this internal pressure, the AFM reduced Wintory’s fine to $2,500. Now, it’s threatening to expel Wintory because he hasn’t paid up.
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So, who’s working for who? Unions are supposed to represent their members. That’s why members pay fees. AFM seems to genuinely have no concern about the well-being of its artists. (It doesn’t care much for the general public either.) It fines them when they seek to do work they’ve been locked out of by a contract they never wanted and it keeps its negotiations with other entities secret until the ink has dried on all the signatures — none of which belong to the members supposedly being “represented.”
Whatever use they once had, labor unions are now only about hiring and paying union officials.